AASP Primary Records Program

AASP Newsletter 29(3): p. 11-12, 1996.
"From Far and Wide"
Jim Riding

Dr. Mavis A. Butterworth

I begin this UK report with the sad news of the death of Dr. Mavis A. Butterworth on the 26th of May this year. The funeral was held on the 5th of June at Stockport, Cheshire. Mavis was one of the most prominent figures in Carboniferous palynology and is perhaps best known for her joint publication with Harold Smith, "Miospores in the coal seams of the Carboniferous of Great Britain." This major work was published in June 1967 and is the first of the Palaeontological Association's series "Special Papers in Palaeontology." The monograph runs to 324 pages and 27 plates and it is still deemed to be an indispensable reference on Carboniferous palynology.

Mavis Ann Butterworth was born in early 1927 and went on to study at the University of Edinburgh, graduating in 1949. Her first job was with the Scottish Coal Survey and she published her first paper in 1952. She moved to the Coal Survey Laboratory in Chester. While working for the Coal Survey, Mavis registered as an external research student at her alma mater, the University of Edinburgh and received her PhD in 1949. In the early 1960s she embarked on an academic career when she accepted a place on the staff of the Geology Department at the University of Sheffield, where she worked especially closely with Roger Neves and Herbert Sullivan. In 1963 she moved on to what became the University of Aston in Birmingham; ironically the Department of Geology at Aston was subsumed into the University of Birmingham in the late 1980s. Her former research students at Aston include Mike Whitaker and Salih Malih. Mavis retired from the University five years ago and lived in Alderly Edge in Cheshire. Our sincere condolences go to her family and friends.